


The Twelve Days of Christmas

by Zab43



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, Twelve Days of Christmas - Anonymous (Song)
Genre: Birds, Christmas, Christmas Presents, Comedy, Demons and Angels, Gen, Silly, Sorry Not Sorry, They're thankfully quite short though, Twelve Verses - Twelve Chapters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-07
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:41:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 11,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27938262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zab43/pseuds/Zab43
Summary: When Gabriel decides to get some Christmas presents for his demon true-love he takes the Twelve Days of Christmas song as his inspiration. Although, things don’t quite follow the accepted lyrics, and sometimes they go very off-track.Christmas silliness and nothing more - relatively short little skitsOn the first day of Christmas my true love sent to meA partridge in a pear tree…..
Relationships: Beelzebub/Gabriel (Good Omens), Hastur/Ligur (Good Omens)
Comments: 71
Kudos: 26





	1. On The First Day of Christmas

Beelzebub was not in a good mood. She had just got to her office and encountered an unexpected obstacle.

“What the heaven is this… this THING doing in my office!” She yelled.

From somewhere behind the verdant greenery came an exasperated voice “Gabriel bought it”.

As this obviously hadn’t answered the question Beelzebub tried again “What is it?”

“Errrr, some sort of plant I think. A big one with a brown stalk” Dagon had never really paid much attention to earth and it ‘s flora and fauna. Even in Eden she had been concerned with thing that lived under the water.

“I can see it’s a tree Dagon” Beelzebub rolled her eyes and edged around the trunk to get to where her desk used to be. At this a weird whimpering hiss came from somewhere up in the branches.

The small demon made the mistake of pausing and looking up. A beak flew at her, opening widely and attempting to nip at her face. Behind it two large, white-tipped, wings spread, flapping manically and sending leaves flying. The leaves were rapidly followed by a heavier object that smacked painfully on the demon’s head.

Beelzebub retreated. She took a deep breath, then retrieved a phone from her pocket and dialled. The rustling of leaves and hissing squeaks continued for some time while the connection was established.

Somewhere in heaven a noise started up “da-da-da-dah, da-da-da-dah” - Ode to Joy sounded loud and clear, shattering the peaceful harmonies of the celestial choir. Gabriel made some frantic waving motions to indicate he would take the call outside, as he pushed through the harp wielding ranks of angels.

“Whatzz the meaning of thizzz, thizzz, thizzz THING!” A very angry sounding voice buzzed out from the small handset.

Gabriel was surprised. He thought the gift had been very well thought out. “It’s a Partridge in a Pear Tree” he said, as if this explained everything.

Sensing the message hadn’t got home he continued “it’s a song. The humans sing it ‘On the first day of Christmas my true love sent to me, a partridge in a pear tree’ it’s romantic” his singing voice was slightly off key and Beelzebub winced.

“Pear trees do not grow thizz big. I ought to know, I made them once” Beelzebub snapped back at him.

Gabriel frowned. He’d forgotten about the need for substitutions. It was true that the tree wasn’t exactly a pear tree, but he had found some pears and stuck them onto the branches with some sort of sticky tape. He hastened to explain this to his demon love.

“Zzzo, it’s a pine tree?” She asked disbelievingly “with pears sellotaped to it?”

“Yes. A pine tree. It begins with the same letter” Gabriel said flatly. Now he came to think about it, a 60 foot pine wasn’t perhaps the ideal substitute for the little ornamental pear tree he’d seen in the picture book. It was the best he’d been able to come up with in a hurry though.

There was silence at the other end of the line. Silence that was suddenly shattered by a loud hiss and a lot of screaming. Gabriel frowned. There had been another substitution that, in hindsight, wasn’t quite as clever as he’d thought.

After a few confused seconds he heard a door slamming in the background and a deceptively calm voice said “it isn’t a partridge either is it?”

“Wellll, errr, not exactly” the Archangel admitted.

“What is it?”

The question was put patiently enough, but he could sense all was not right. Fiddling with his tie nervously he replied “I wanted something that sounded like partridge”.

“Gabriel, I won’t azzzk again, what the Heaven izzz it?”

The buzzing had got worse, this wasn’t a good sign. Although, now the gift had been delivered he couldn’t keep it secret, she’d find out sooner or later…. He took a deep breath and admitted it: “an ostrich”.

There was a heavy sigh at the end of the line. That was better than he’d expected. “Ostrich?” the question was asked calmly enough, maybe she wasn’t too angry. “Did you say ostrich?!” actually, on second thoughts, she did sound maybe just a little cross.

He nodded, realising quite quickly that she couldn’t see it and squeaking out “yes” in a voice totally different from his usual confident boom.

Beelzebub was confounded. In a genuinely curious voice she asked “ostriches are ground-dwelling, they can’t even fly. How did you get it into a tree?”

“They don’t fly? That would explain it…” he mused, snapping out of it to explain “I used some rope in the end. I did wonder why it seemed so unhappy, I thought, y’know: birds, trees… they go together don’t they? And it does work for the song doesn’t it? ‘an ostrich in a pine tree’” he crooned.

At the other end of line he heard a snort of laughter. Ah, that was a good sign. He smiled happily. His gift had met with his love’s approval. Wait until she saw what he’d got lined up for tomorrow.


	2. On The Second Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the second day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Two turtle doves.....

The next morning Beelzebub opened her office door carefully, wary of what she might find. She needn’t have worried, all was quiet.

Uncharacteristically Dagon wasn’t there to greet her. Instead Hastur stood in front of her desk, clutching an untidy looking file. He looked guilty. This wasn’t unusual. What was unusual was the little pile of feathers by his feet.

Beelzebub looked him up and down, then shoved past to get to her chair, sitting down and putting her feet up on the desk in front of her.

She noted an envelope on the desk. It was a delicate eggshell blue with glowing golden edges and an unmistakably angelic smell about it.

In front of the desk Hastur shuffled. He pushed the file towards her, dislodging another feather, which he batted away hastily. Dropping the file on the desk he took a stealthy step backwards “my Lord, the latest report on the imp shortage, as you requested - first thing in the morning - all on time. Thank you, it’s all there, better be going now” he was still edging towards the exit.

“Stand still” Beelzebub instructed him as she pushed the file to one side.

Opening the envelope she saw it contained the inevitable card from the Archangel. After yesterday’s fiasco she didn’t trust it, thinking there could be another ostrich or similar lurking around somewhere. She decided to keep Hastur close by so he could deal with any problems. “Stay there” she barked at him.

Inside the envelope was a thick cream coloured card. It had the words “On the second day of Christmas my true love sent to me, two turtle doves” with a badly drawn heart under it. She frowned. What exactly was a ‘turtle dove’?

Looking around the office she couldn’t see anything either turtle shaped, or dove shaped. Then she remembered the feathers.

“Hastur…” she said slowly. The Duke of Hell jumped and swung an arm round in a hasty salute.

“My Lord?” He asked smartly. Although his stance was of a soldier standing to attention, his eyes were shifty. He’s looking for an exit, she thought.

“Hastur” she said again, softly and with more than a hint of menace to the word.

“I want you to think carefully before you answer” realising what she said she added “that’s ‘think’ Hastur, remember, we talked about it? Think - use your brain to form an idea and try to connect it to another idea before you say anything - yes?”

The demon before her nodded unhappily.

“Now tell me, when you came here this morning, before I got here, was there something else here?”

She saw the panicked look in his eye and sat back smiling grimly to herself. Just as she’d thought.

“They was attacking me!” shouted Hastur, flapping his arms around to simulate defending himself against an unseen adversary. “Angel things, all white feathers, trying to kill me!”

“For badness sake, get yourself under control Hastur. What was attacking you?”

The tall demon slowed his flapping and started to look shifty again. “They was like little angels” he said sulkily, looking to the floor.

Beelzebub followed his gaze and saw that some of the pile of white feathers were bloodstained. “What did you do with my present Hastur?” she asked, in what, for an angry demon, was quite a reasonable tone of voice.

“They started it!” The tall demon was still trying to defend his actions “flew at me outta nowhere, how was I to know they was a present?”

Beelzebub sighed. “What did you do?” a dangerous edge to the question.

Hastur finished flapping and looked down at his boss with, as near as he could manage, a contrite expression on his grubby face. “Mighta eaten ‘em” he finally admitted.

“S’alright, I’ll report to the pits myself” he sighed in a resigned way and turned, shuffling towards the door, as Beelzebub dialled Gabriel’s number.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the second day of Christmas my true love sent to me:  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree
> 
> ...continued tomorrow (I know the 12 days of Christmas don't technically start until Christmas day but I started early!)


	3. On The Third Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the third day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Three French hens

Day three and Beelzebub felt she’d got the measure of the weirdness awaiting her. Birds. That was the theme. First an ostrich (in a pine tree) then two doves - or ‘little angels’ as Hastur had called them. She sniggered at the thought of Hastur in a panic, being ‘attacked’ by the pair of doves.

Equipped with a net she flung the office door open waiting to catch whatever flew at her. Instead of a feathered attacker she heard a terrible noise.

Shaking her head she looked at the scene in front of her. Dagon, Hastur and Ligur were all sat at her desk this time, each clutching a tangled collection of brass coloured tubes, with wide openings at one end.

They were blowing into what she could only assume were musical instruments of some sort. Instruments that clearly took some practise as the only sound they seemed to be getting out of them was a sort of wet farting noise.

“What the heaven are you three doing?” asked the small demon.

At this Hastur finally got the thing to work and it made a loud, and surprisingly tuneful, sound. He was so surprised that he nearly tipped his chair over backwards. He was caught expertly by Ligur and held in place, balanced on the back legs, holding the collection of tubes in one hand and staring at it in disbelief.

Beelzebub laughed, long and hard. It was genuinely the funniest thing she’d seen in centuries.

Hastur breathed a sigh of relief. Then Ligur let him go. The small demon couldn’t tell whether this was done maliciously or accidentally. Either way, as Hastur hit the floor, all the air in his lungs was knocked out and into the affronted instrument, which gave a particularly loud ‘parp’ in E-Flat.

All the demons broke into fits of giggles, apart from poor Hastur, who took his time disentangling himself from the offending chair and brass instrument.

“Dunt see what’s so funny” he said sulkily.

Beelzebub was struggling to breathe through her bout of hysteria.

Her phone sprung into life, screaming out “…all the girlies say I'm pretty fly, for a white guy”. Why had she ever let Gabriel chose his own ring-tone? It wasn’t like he even understood the lyrics….

She hit the speaker button, intending to let him hear the musical catastrophe. His cheerfully triumphant voice came loud through the speakers “…my true love sent to me, three French horns!”

Beelzebub couldn’t help but start laughing again.

From behind her Dagon (who had efficiently decided to look up the song in question) shouted “French Hens you dolt! It’s meant to be hens!”

“Oh, er, what is a French Hen?” Gabriel sounded a bit disappointed.

Beelzebub answered “it doesn’t matter, this is the best present so far!” She had intended to try to put a stop to the whole thing today, but this was just too funny. Somehow she felt she would regret indulging him….

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the third day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	4. On The Fourth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the fourth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Four calling birds,

Day four, thought Beelzebub with some trepidation.

Today she was late to the office, hoping that the other demons would again have got there first and dealt with whatever crazy present Gabriel had sent this time.

Before she got near the door she could hear it. There was a fight going on.

Right, this was something she could deal with very well herself. Opening the door she yelled “Oi!” as loudly as her small lungs allowed.

Before her were not scrapping demons. They were human and wearing some sort of uniforms. Bright red uniforms that included huge furry hats and shiny buttons. They also didn’t appear to understand the danger they were in and continued their fight, totally ignoring the small demon.

She watched fascinated as the four humans swung punches and elbows trying for all they were worth to seriously injure their compatriots. At least she assumed they were compatriots given the matching uniforms.

Beelzebub sniffed carefully, maybe the were drunk. Nope. There was no smell of alcohol. There was, however, a definitely Heavenly -ish sort of aura hanging around them. Almost like someone had performed some sort of miracle in their vicinity. Was this Gabriel’s doing?

The fight progressed and one of the humans picked a chair up and bashed it over another’s head, knocking off the furry hat. The un-hatted man bellowed in rage and threw himself at his attacker.

Behind her Beelzebub could hear laughter. She snapped her fingers and the humans froze mid-brawl.

Dagon stopped laughing as she saw Beelzebub’s confused face. Without a word she handed over the angelic card.

Opening it she saw Gabriel’s familiar writing - all curls and loops with little hearts above the ‘i’s. What she read didn’t make sense.

“On the fourth day of Christmas my true love sent to me: Four Brawling Guards (p.s. it was Dagon’s idea)”

“Dagon - what does he mean ‘your idea’?” she said suspiciously. Then, gesturing at the red uniformed humans she added “are these guards? What are they guarding?”

Dagon smiled nervously, she hadn’t expected Gabriel to actually tell her boss this was her idea. Having seen the ‘Day Four’ present she had really felt Gabriel needed help - more birds just wasn’t a good idea in Hell - certainly not with demons like Hastur around. Now she was regretting interfering. Hopefully she’d find it funny - like the French horns.

“They’re palace guards, from earth - they guard the Queen of England” she explained, thinking the prestigiousness of the guard might make up for their sudden appearance in Beelzebub’s office.

“Why have they got furry hats?” the small demon asked puzzled by the incongruity of the ostentatious headgear.

“Made of bearskins apparently” Dagon also wasn’t sure why humans guarding a queen would wear bits of a dead animal on their heads, but had approved of the idea. It was so very close to Beelzebub’s own fly-hat, only made of bears, which were much fiercer, and they were much bigger too. On second thoughts it didn’t seem such a good idea.

Beelzebub, however, didn’t seem to have noticed. “Why are they fighting in my office?” she asked instead.

“Brawling, not fighting” Dagon corrected. Seeing her boss’s less than impressed look at this presumption she carried on hastily. “It was meant to be birds again, but I thought you’d prefer something else…. and a good brawl is always fun to watch, especially if it’s in fancy dress”.

Dagon tried to lend some of her undoubted demonic influence to the explanation, suddenly realising it wasn’t such a good idea after all. She smiled at her diminutive boss hoping against hope that she would find it funny.

The Lord of the Flies showed no sign of being amused and Dagon’s smile turned into more of a grimace of fear. In her terror she started laughing as if, by doing so herself, she would encourage the other to find it funny too.

“PITS!” shouted Beelzebub and watched as her crestfallen second in commanded trudged off to await her punishment.

As soon as she was out of the office Beelzebub miracled up a chair in the far corner of the office, together with a large bowl of popcorn. Snapping her fingers made the four humans resume their brawl and she sighed happily while they tried to kill each other for her amusement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the fourth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	5. On The Fifth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the fifth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Five Gold Rings!

After the amusement of yesterday’s fight Beelzebub was almost looking forward to finding out what Gabriel had thought of next.

She had relented and intercepted Dagon on the way to the pits and the two of them had watched as the humans beat each other into unconsciousness. The present had, in the end, set exactly the right tone for a gift in Hell.

Dagon had offered to run her through the remaining lines of the song, but she had decided the element of surprise was part of the fun. Although, she would never, ever admit that to Gabriel.

Making an early start she walked briskly in the direction of her office. It was ominously quiet, not even the sound of screams from the direction of the pits. Dagon was stood outside with an unfathomable expression on her scaly face.

“Just so you know this had nothing to do with me!” She declared with a nervous glance towards the office door.

Beelzebub screwed up her face, scowling at her second in command. “Why, what it is?” She asked suspiciously “and why is it so quiet?”

Dagon glanced around as if this was the first time she’d noticed the complete absence of any demons and any noise. “Not sure” she squeaked.

This was all very suspicious. Before she managed to get the door open Dagon managed to get herself in the way to add “it wasn’t any of us, remember that, this was all his idea….”

The fly demon shoved her out of the way in an aggressive, but not entirely unfriendly, way. She took in a deep breath preparing herself for the worst. If the other demons were wary she really wasn’t looking forward to finding out what the Archangel had thought to bring this time.

She pushed open the door slowly. As she did so a smell began to make itself known. It was a pervasive smell, cloying and exceedingly unpleasant. There were sweet notes, faecal notes, fermented and decaying notes. Beelzebub’s flies hummed in appreciation.

From behind her she heard a loud sniffing. Turing she noticed Hastur, he was stood a little distance away, tasting the air and looking perplexed. “You wearin’ perfume?” He asked. Dagon flapped at him hissing ‘go away’. Uncharacteristically, he took the hint and left.

Beelzebub turned back to the door. The smell was strong enough to have an almost physical presence by now and the door was still half closed.

Once opened to it’s fullest extent the ‘present’ was revealed in all it’s glory. A pile of dead and rotting meat oozing on her desk. Beelzebub was stunned. Her flies, on the other hand, rejoiced.

Dagon watched nervously from the door as her boss entered the room. Despite being a demon, and therefore used to unpleasantness, even Dagon didn’t want to go in there. The foul, putrid stench stung her nostrils and made her eyes water. Even without breathing it seemed to find a way in, like something was crawling up her nose and into her mouth. It was disgusting.

Beelzebub however, appeared immune to any ill effects. The swarm of flies seemed to expand and expand until the entire room was filled with buzzing. It was a plague to rival anything described in Exodus. A vast cloud of blackness dense enough to shut out all light, pulsing and buzzing like one, vast, living creature.

Dagon stood back, concerned about what may happen if she got caught in the frenzy.

After a minute or two the flies began to thin out. The smell had also dissipated. Sitting at her desk was a small demon with a stupidly large and rather soppy grin on her face. All that was left of the source of the smell were five bones, picked clean of their rotting meat.

The scaly demon entered the room carefully, holding the angelic card out to her boss. Beelzebub opened the envelope and pulled it out eagerly. She read “On the fifth day of Christmas my true love sent to me, five rotting things!”

The perfect present for the Lord of the Flies. Maybe Gabriel wasn’t as dumb as he appeared to be mused the small demon. Dagon breathed a sigh of relief.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the fifth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	6. On The Sixth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the sixth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Six geese a-laying,

After the success of Day Five Gabriel was again feeling nervous. Having given, what his true-love had told him was a perfect gift, he wasn’t sure where to go without it being a disappointment.

The song referred to geese. He’d encountered these creatures before and thought of them as a lot like demons. They were fierce, noisy, curious and, when you got to know them, reasonably friendly… some of the time anyway.

It was the ‘getting to know them’ bit that he was unsure about. He’d been nipped many times and the honking was starting to give him a headache. The flock had pulled the stuffing out of his chair and one had used it to make some sort of nest. He simply couldn’t deliver this brood of noisy vandals to his beloved - could he?

This was the point that he’d thought he needed help. Who better to ask than another demon? Not that the geese were really demons - no matter how much they might act like they were - but near enough.

He’d tentatively broached the subject with Beelzebub - who had entirely misunderstood. Demons didn’t, he supposed, really ever ask for ‘help’. His demon-love seemed to think he wanted some sort of slave crossed with a punching bag - as Hastur had pissed her off by eating Day Two’s present she’d sent him along.

Gabriel eyed Hastur warily. He’d already put some newspaper down for the geese, but now hastened to add more to the area around the grubby demon.

The geese followed closely, occasionally honking and snapping at an unguarded hand. Hastur watched closely too. It was unnerving to have all those eyes staring at him.

As he reached his desk one of the birds broke free from the others, flapping it’s wings and honking loudly. It flew towards Gabriel’s head. He ducked as the attack-goose flew over him and sat on his chair.

He suddenly realised that, even with the goose currently pecking at his chair, there were only five again. He sighed, looking around for the missing sixth goose. There it was, squashed into the footwell of the desk, honking loudly in his direction. It kept doing that.

“Can you help?” He asked the demon in a slightly exasperated voice, indicating a little wooden house, painted in white with red hearts on the outside, that was meant to be the geese’s home.

“Help?” echoed the demon screwing his face up in distaste at the word.

“Yes, help. These are meant for Beelzebub, they’re a present. They should all be in their coop, but this one keeps going under my desk and the others are attacking me. I don’t know what to do!”

Hastur looked at the geese warily. The one sat on Gabriel’s chair honked loudly and went to the toilet. He didn’t think that would make a very good present.

The Archangel had noted the goose’s deposit and despaired. He looked helplessly at the demon, flapping his arms toward the little wooden house and trying to kick the wayward goose out from under his desk.

“Dunt reckon that’s gonna work” said the demon, scratching his nose as he contemplated the geese.

“It has to work! It’s part of the present. I’ve got to have six, it’s day six: ‘six geese a-laying’ not five!”

“Ah, a-laying is just about right innit?” said the infuriating demon with a grin. At this point Gabriel decided he understood his demon-love’s dislike of her underling.

Hastur, however, was cautiously approaching the goose ensconced under his desk. Gabriel stood back warily. A flurry of feathers and a few screams later and the goose was out from under the table and locked in the coop. It was making a terrific honking noise.

Hastur calmly rounded up the other geese and, by some demonic miracle, they followed him in a docile manner, honking occasionally and nipping affectionately at the bottom of his coat.

He closed the lid on the last of the geese…. and then crawled under the desk himself.

Gabriel was baffled “you’re meant to be helping! What are you doing?”

“I am helpin’ - you can take the gooses now - I got this”. He sounded inordinately pleased with himself.

Gabriel looked at the goose-house, rocking slightly due to it’s cargo of angry geese, then looked back at the desk. Hastur’s feet could just about be seen, but the rest of the demon was firmly established under the desk.

“You can take ‘em now. While you’re there tell Ligur to come up ‘ere will ya? We’ll need to take turns”.

“What are you talking about?!” Gabriel was baffled. He was impressed with the way the demon had expertly herded the geese into their house, but simply couldn’t understand what he was now doing under the desk, or why he’d need another demon to take turns, or, for that matter, what he’d be taking turns doing.

The whole thing was far too confusing. He decided to simply take the gift down to Hell before he missed Day Six altogether. He did, however, remember to pass Hastur’s message onto Dagon who scurried off, presumably to find Ligur.

Beelzebub was not impressed by a dishevelled looking Gabriel carrying a box that seemed to be full of loud angry things. She thought about Pandora and demanded he take the ‘gift’ away before irreparable harm was done.

Gabriel was depressed. He trudged through Hell’s muddy puddles, the rocking, honking wooden house just about held under one arm. He couldn’t, he simply couldn’t, take the geese back up to Heaven with him.

In the end he released them into a park up on earth. There he watched them flap and stumble towards the lake, happily honking at their unexpected freedom.

Back up in Heaven he was surprised to find the demon still under his desk. He sighed heavily. Today couldn’t really get much worse. “What are you doing?” he said in a depressed voice.

Behind him a second demon answered “he’s incubatin’ ‘em”.

The answer made no sense whatsoever. Gabriel opened and closed his mouth a few times. Under the desk he heard a noise and the hidden demon yelled “they’s hatching!”

A little while later a proud demon emerged from under his desk, leading behind him a line of little geese - six little geese in fact. 

“Look at the little geeselings Lig! They thinks I’m their mum! Can we show Beelzebub? Aww go-on - look at ‘em waddling”. The goslings were indeed waddling after the demon in a very devoted way.

Ligur offered his arm in a fond way muttering “you’ll be a great mum Hast” as the two surrogate parents lead their brood back down to Hell.

Beelzebub had rolled her eyes as Hastur promenaded his brood of miniature birds round her office. She yawned widely and droned “yezzz well, you’d better look after them, I don’t want to find them in here!” Hastur had grinned and led the geese away.

Well, she thought, at least Gabriel had found something to keep her most annoying of underlings busy for now. Not a total disaster then…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the sixth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	7. On The Seventh Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the seventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Seven swans a-swimming,

Day seven dawned and Gabriel was nervous. Despite being reassured that the unexpected geese had, in fact, not been a total failure as a present, the Archangel felt he was losing ground.

Dagon had advised against more birds. He’d taken one look at ‘swans’ and also decided the large white-feathered, suspiciously goose-like, creatures were a definite no-no.

He needed something ‘swimming’ though - something that would fit the song. Seven of them. What creatures began with ‘s’? The first thing that sprang to mind was ‘sheep’ - The Lord is Thy Shepherd after all. Did sheep swim? Somehow it didn’t sound right

His imagination had given up and he’d asked Dagon. The scaly demon had a vested interest in keeping her boss happy. The ostrich incident had led to some considerable unpleasantness and, although the other presents hadn’t caused too much trouble (apart from for Hastur), she didn’t want any catastrophes.

Together they’d hit on a plan and were standing warily outside Beelzebub’s office when she arrived. Gabriel clutching a white envelope, Dagon in an incongruously large coat, holding a peculiar frilly mob-cap type hat in dark blue with white stripes round the edge.

The Lord of the Flies saw the pair and nearly turned back. Too late Gabriel rushed over and bent down, expertly dodging the would-be-slap and planting a kiss on her cheek. He bundled up her arm in his and confidently pulled her off down the corridor.

Not given much choice the demon allowed herself to be guided along several long halls and down, always down. It got warmer and she could hear the faint screams from the pits. Was Gabriel going to report himself to the pits for her amusement? The idea briefly cheered her, but they continued on past the turning for eternal torment and on through the Hell-Hound breeding rooms.

Triumphantly grabbing her shoulders Gabriel propelled her though a cave mouth and into a large rocky opening. There was a steaming pool that smelled strongly of rotten eggs in front of her. Ah - this was the Hell-Spawn training pond. Not that that explained anything.

“Ta-daaah!” cried the Archangel passing his demon-love the card for day seven.

“On the seventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me, seven Hell-spawn swimming!” Beelzebub frowned. There was no sign of any spawns as far as she could see.

Then she noticed Dagon edging round her to get to the side of the pond. She had removed the large coat to reveal a bathing costume from a much more modest era. It was long legged and long sleeved with decorative frills and a high buttoned front. The colouring was dark blue with white stripes to match the mob-cap that Dagon was expertly tucking her hair into.

The fish demon cleared her throat “year three - are you ready?” Even in Hell learning was important and Dagon was Hell’s designated swimming instructor. The hastily assembled display team of small Hell-spawn shuffled out from behind a rock and Dagon led the way into the pond.

Beelzebub was increasingly baffled by this performance and looked to Gabriel for an explanation. He was grinning widely. It was not reassuring. Suddenly he darted off behind a rock of his own and was followed out by a reluctant looking string quartet, who did their best to set up in Hell’s rocky basement.

They struck up a tune - dah, de dah, de dah…. Gabriel hissed at Beelzebub “it’s called ‘Swan Lake’” and winked alarmingly, nodding towards the pool where year three had begun their performance.

Observing a whole class of miniature demons attempting a synchronised swimming version of swan lake was weird enough. Given the effect of the excessively humid conditions on the tuning of the string instruments, the slightly off-key accompaniment only enhanced the oddness. When one little demon kicked another in the face (possibly inadvertently) and a full on fight broke out, it defied description.

“Kevin! You let go of Audrey’s leg this minute and Adrian if you can’t sew that arm back on yourself don’t come asking me for help!” Dagon yelled at the misbehaving class.

Gabriel’s smile had become a little strained. He still felt this was going better than the geese and put a tentative arm around the recipient of this rather surreal present. Beelzebub was simply stunned. It wasn’t that she didn’t appreciate the effort but….but, well, words defeated her.

The unruly Hell-spawn had mostly been bought under control and Dagon was leading them off through a gap in the rocks when a movement down the far end of the cave caught her attention.

Hastur stealthily entered the bathing cave, looking left and right but entirely failing to notice the string quartet, his baffled looking boss and the attendant Archangel. As he fully emerged they saw he was followed by the line of goslings.

Without a pause Hastur clambered into the pond and waded out towards the middle. The first of the little geese followed him, happily paddling to keep up with their ‘mum’. At the back of the line Ligur encouraged the stragglers into the pond.

Once they were all assembled in the water Hastur produced a handful of maggots (best not to speculate where from) and began to entice the baby geese to swim with the promise of a tasty, wriggly treat.

Beelzebub and Gabriel looked at each other and both made the decision to back quietly out of the bathing cave, pausing only to disappear the unlikely string quartet on the way out. Well - today had at least been an experience to remember thought Beelzebub.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the seventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Seven Hell-spawn swimming,  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	8. On The Eighth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the eighth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Eight maids a milking,

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies to Eric the disposable demon for putting him in this situation - a warning for possibly inappropriate behaviour involving bovines here...

As far as questions went: “why are there cows in my office?” wasn’t one that Beelzebub ever thought she’d need to use......

As Day Eight had dawned, the Lord of the Flies emerged from her very plush cavern (just the right distance from the fiery lake to make the ambient temperature bearable and keep the worst of the damp at bay) and made her way reluctantly up to work. There was rather a lot of noise coming from her office. That was worrying.

On opening the door she found the need to employ the hitherto unused question and was none too pleased about it. As far as questions went it was up there with “what am I meant to do with this ostrich?” on the list of things she never wanted to have to ask again.

There weren’t eight cows at least. Gabriel had considered this and dismissed it, the important point was that there were ‘eight maids a-milking’, not eight cows. He thought they could easily share one between two. So, unbeknownst to Beelzebub, she should have been thankful that there were *only* four cows in the office.

There were though, eight Erics. Eric, being the lowest order of demon aka ‘disposable’, had many iterations. He was above the ushers and imps in order of precedent, but below all of the demons…. and, he had discovered, he also seemed to be below the demons’ ‘significant others’ too.

Gabriel had pondered ‘maids a-milking’ and dismissed the use of humans. The profession of milk-maid seemed to have died out somewhat. Despite a noble heritage, including inspiring the inoculation against small pox, it appeared they were no longer essential to human farm life.

He did, however, know what a milk-maid was supposed to look like. They had long dresses, with aprons and frilly white hats. They carried buckets on a strange wooden pole-like contraption and sat on little stools.

They also did something he was rather uncomfortable with to cows’ nether regions. He believed it involved the extraction of gross-matter and so he chose not to think about it. The important thing was that they should look the part, whether or not the whole ‘milking’ bit was carried out didn’t matter too much.

To this end he had sneaked down to Hell - as well as a glowing Archangel with six huge wings can ‘sneak’ - and looked for likely milk-maids. Dagon had refused to help. His other ‘go-to’ demon declared he was too busy trying to train his family of geese to attack unwary imps to get involved. He did, however, suggest the Erics.

Gabriel had seen Erics - or Ericas for that matter, let’s not be sexist about this (not that demons really have a ‘sex’ per se, but anyway….). The Archangel had found a small gathering of them attempting to be inconspicuous while drinking something out of a stone flagon with a long row of Xs on it. They were a little unsteady on their collective feet and appeared amenable to making their bosses happy.

The Erics were kitted out in the requisite dresses, caps and aprons. The Archangel had then miracled down some cows and attempted to explain his plan. It hadn’t exactly gone down well. While Eric was resigned to looking silly the added embarrassment of ‘interfering’ with a cow while doing so was maybe a step too far.

Gabriel had pulled rank. Not that he was sure whether he had any ‘rank’ in Hell, but he’d found over the millennia that if you assumed you were in charge most entities simply went along with it. Given his promise that cooperating would ensure the Erics got out of Beelzebub’s worst bad books he’d gained their reluctant agreement.

Hence, on opening her office door, Beelzebub was confronted by four large bovines being hesitantly fondled by a herd of Erics. All participants looked intensely unhappy.

The cattle were, what is technically known as, ‘lowing’. It was a sound unlike anything Hell had ever heard before and entirely unbefitting for the office of Hell’s legislative chief, second only to Satan and Lord of the Flies.

Beelzebub screamed “Gabriel!” so loudly it could be heard up in heaven. The Archangel put his head in his hands, today’s gift clearly hadn’t had the desired effect. He prepared himself for a ‘telling off’ from his demon-love and very slowly made his way down to Hell.

In the meanwhile the lowing and shouting had attracted quite a bit of attention. The miserable Erics had flushed with angry shame as various demons poked their heads into the office and laughed at them. Their futile attempts to get any actual milk out of the unsteady beasts and into the waiting buckets was getting ridiculous.

They sat miserably on their little stools as Gabriel arrived looking sheepish. Beelzebub pointed to the scene in her office and demanded to know what he thought he was playing at. Wordlessly he handed her the card and she read “On the eighth day of Christmas my true love sent to me, eight maids a-milking”. There was a rather shaky drawing of a friesian cow with the mottled black spots drawn in the shape of hearts.

He grinned hopefully at her as Hastur and Ligur joined the throng, accompanied by the occasionally honking gaggle of little geese. Looking at the card, and then at the tableau of Erics, Ligur asked “ain’t gonna get much milk outta them are ya?”

“What do you mean?” asked the nearest Eric.

At this the Duke broke the news that, rather than ‘cows’ the rather unworldly Archangel had instead managed to provide their male equivalent. The Erics were attempting to ‘milk’ bulls.

As the demons, even the enraged Beelzebub, began various dirty sounding laughs Gabriel blushed. He had felt something wasn’t quite right. The large horns and somewhat aggressive manner of the beasts, taken with the rather obvious lack of milk, was now explained.

If Gabriel was embarrassed then the Erics were mortified. This was the worst thing that had happened to them. Actually, when they considered the ‘outing’ to the pits with Hastur to help him train the Hell-spawn of year ten in elementary torments, maybe it was only the second worst.

Actually, this was Hell and ‘milking’ bulls in fancy-dress while being laughed at by virtually all of the senior demon staff would barely make the top ten when they thought about it. It still wasn’t pleasant. They departed en masse to sulk somewhere in the deepest pits, hopefully aided by strong alcohol.

Gabriel watched the departure of the Erics with dismay. Not only had the present gone horribly wrong, but the main part of the gift had up and walked off right in the middle of the performance.

Beelzebub, however, seemed to have cheered up a little. The ‘cows’ were hastily miracled back up to a field somewhere and Gabriel suggested that he would provide something sweet and sticky for his demon-love’s breakfast in lieu of any maids a-milking. The suggestion was received, if not gratefully, then at least not too angrily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the eighth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Eight Erics sulking,  
> Seven Hell-spawn swimming,  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	9. On The Ninth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the ninth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Nine ladies dancing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ....an altogether more wholesome chapter

Gabriel was trying to be confident that today would go without a hitch. He felt that if he believed hard enough then nothing could go wrong. As an Archangel he was meant to be good at blind faith and he dug deep into his reserves to boost his shaky conviction in the plan for Day Nine.

This time he’d involved, not only Dagon, but also Hastur and Ligur along with several of the other senior demons. The scene was set and he couldn’t wait to begin. Really he couldn’t. It wasn’t at all that he was intensely nervous, the fluttering in his stomach was excitement not stress. Honest.

Unfortunately today’s ‘event’ wasn’t due until the evening. An after-work present. This meant both he and Beelzebub were on edge all day.

She gave up around lunchtime and texted him, certainly not because she was missing the day’s gift. She absolutely didn’t want to encourage this ridiculous behaviour - oh no. It was just that, having had a present for every other of the days so far, she was rather apprehensive as to what ‘surprise’ may spring out at her at any moment. At least this was what she told herself. It most definitely wasn’t because she was enjoying the effort the Archangel was putting into the gifts.

A Lord of Hell does deserve tributes after all, and she knew he was really trying to impress her. It was quite sweet when she allowed herself to think about it. At this thought the demon screwed up her face into an appropriate scowl and promptly sent the whole of internal audit to the pits just to reassure herself she wasn’t going soft.

Gabriel’s return text was reassuring - and slightly sickening (far too many hearts, smiling faces with hearts for eyes, virtual kisses, more hearts etc). The scowl intensified, but somehow the promise of a ‘gift’ she would ‘really enjoy’ made the rest of the day more bearable.

Evening came and still nothing had turned up. Beelzebub paced up and down her cavern, her flies buzzing softly in sympathy with her pensive mood. What exactly had that buffoon planned this time? Would she really ‘enjoy’ it? Where was he?!

All of a sudden she heard the sound of a door-bell. She didn’t have a door bell. She didn’t have a door in fact, caves in Hell not usually coming so equipped. It had to be the Archangel - no-one else would go to the trouble of creating a door-bell just to make a polite entrance. She hastily threw herself onto the sagging sofa and pretended as hard as she could that she hadn’t been waiting for him.

“Come in” barked the small demon. Gabriel entered. He was wearing a turquoise tuxedo with a purple silk handkerchief, cummerbund and bow tie. He looked the little Lord of Hell up and down and narrowly avoided giving her a disapproving glare.

His text had requested she don ‘formal dress’. Beelzebub appeared to have taken this to mean formal military dress and was resplendent with sash and medals. He’d been hoping for a dress. When he considered that he realised he should have known better.

He couldn’t quite imagine his demon-love wearing a prom-dress… Maybe something figure hugging in black and red satin, possibly with diamonte flies… He briefly considered creating one, but dismissed the thought almost as soon as it attempted to nestle in his head. He wanted her to enjoy the present not try to kill him.

Offering his arm he was mildly surprised when she took it without demure. He led her off through the corridors of Hell. This time to the upper halls rather than down towards the pits.

They arrived in the, considerably lighter and airier, higher regions of Hell. Although much nicer than the working floors, and almost infinitely better than the stuffy, odorous darkness of the pits, the upper halls were still mildly unpleasant. The walls had a light coating of something dark and sticky, the floor was damp and the lights flickered every so often.

Gabriel stopped abruptly, signalling that they had arrived at their destination. There was a large door that Beelzebub knew very well opened into the building housing the official chambers of the Dark Council. This was more and more suspicious. The Archangel really shouldn’t be messing around with the Dark Council.

Concern flitted briefly across the Lord of Hell’s face, quickly replaced with her usual feigned boredom. It wouldn’t do to let him see she might almost be considering caring if he got ripped to shreds by senior demons.

He opened the door with a flourish. All was dark inside. Beelzebub steeled herself, waiting for the worst to happen. Lights flooded the scene. A sash of dark red material hung from the ceiling bearing the legend “On the ninth day of Christmas my true love sent to me, Nine Demons Dancing!!”

There were indeed several assembled demons in the room, clearly waiting to dance. Hastur and Ligur made an obvious pair. Hastur wearing something floaty in green chiffon and sporting a fascinator with droopy, dead flowers above one ear. The look was slightly spoiled by his grubby coat and large black boots.

Dagon wore a shimmering suit in blueish grey. She was holding a small fish-like partner, something like a merman in reverse. He appeared very unsure of how to use his unexpectedly human legs, rolling his large fish eyes around the room nervously.

Asmodeus, three headed and claw footed, clutched tightly onto a succubus of outstanding beauty (if you ignored her vicious fangs and claws). His dragon-like wings fluttered slightly in anticipation of the coming dance, while his partner negligently sunk her claws deeper into the flesh of his arm.

The final pair consisted of a not unattractive (if you squinted in the right way) elderly demon and a two headed, and apparently two gendered, figure with a face either side of his/her head. The two-faced creature wore a combination dress/tuxedo. A white shirt and tie underneath a long tailored jacket, that flared out at the bottom revealing a startlingly bright pinky purple silk lining that contrasted against their short black skirt. Beelzebub glared jealously - she’d be having words with Janus later - upstaging her like that!

There was something not quite right though. “There’s only eight” Beelzebub pointed out in a flat voice, pretending hard that she wasn’t interested in the ‘present’. Gabriel grinned manically and offered her his arm. Ah-ha - nine demons dancing was obviously intended to include her. The unlikely string quartet from Day Seven made a wary reappearance and struck up a tune.

What became immediately apparent was the reason why angels don’t dance. Some people are described as having ‘two left feet’. Gabriel appeared to have many more than this quantity. As he spun his reluctant demon-love around the dance floor he managed to step, not only on her toes, but also on quite a lot of the other dancers’ toes too.

He heard an angry hiss and looked down to see one of Hastur’s adopted brood snapping angrily at his feet. He jumped back in surprise and Hastur hastened to gather up the goose and stow it carefully into the depths of his coat, presumably to join it’s fellows.

Gabriel gave up trying to look at his partner and watched his feet instead. Beelzebub noticed that his smile never wavered, even as beads of sweat formed on his brow with the concentration of not stepping on anything. After a few turns Beelzebub relented and led him gently to a long table at the back.

Dagon had thoughtfully provided a very large bowl of something alcoholic enough that the fumes had started peeling the wallpaper behind it. Beelzebub grabbed a glass and scooped up a large quantity of the bright green liquid, downing it and suppressing a cough.

It was as if this was some sort of signal. The main doors opened again and into the room poured the collected demons of Hell, all eager for free booze and a chance to dance. The string quartet were surprised when they found they’d turned into something more like a 1980s metal band, complete with mullet haircuts, tight leather trousers and wailing guitars.

The evening progressed and Beelzebub drank more of the punch, a slight smile pulling at the edges of her mouth. At her side Gabriel breathed a sigh of relief, Day Nine was a success!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the ninth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Nine demons dancing,  
> Eight Erics sulking,  
> Seven Hell-spawn swimming,  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	10. On The Tenth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the tenth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Ten Lords a Leaping

More than a little hungover Beelzebub reluctantly dragged herself out of bed. Gabriel had stayed over and was still snoring beside her. She gave him a vicious kick. No sense in her being hungover and miserable on her own.

Gabriel leapt out of bed. Without the consumption of ‘gross-matter’ he lacked the hangover, but he was again nervous about the day ahead. Muttering an excuse he flew up to Heaven with more haste than grace, banging his head painfully on the cave roof as he went.

Beelzebub watched in mild surprise. She had vaguely hoped he would try to tempt her into taking a sickie today. She had almost looked forward to staying in her cave and finding ten of something they could do together. This was clearly not to be.

The Lord of the Flies snapped her fingers, clearing the worst of the hangover, and pulled some clothes together for the day ahead. Sighing heavily she trudged up to the office not expecting to hear anything from Gabriel for some time. In this she was wrong.

At the door to her office an apprehensive Dagon waited. This wasn’t a totally unfamiliar occurrence by now and Beelzebub sighed again. “He’s still setting up” her second in command informed her. Setting up? What exactly was he ‘setting up’? she wondered.

From inside the office there started a loud crashing noise. Gabriel’s voice came loud and clear “no, no, no, all together! A-one, a-two, a…..” CRASH! “We go on three Sandalphon! Everyone knows that. Nobody ever goes on two!”. He began the count again.

Intrigued Beelzebub opened the door. There was a slightly painful glow of Heavenly light and a stinging feeling of holiness. The sheer quantity of angels created unpleasant chills down the demon’s back.

Gabriel got to three and the angels all jumped. CRASH! Then again… up and down, up and down: CRASH! CRASH! CRASH! Apparently, despite appearances, angels were not light on their feet.

Beelzebub recognised a scowling Michael, looking daggers at Gabriel as she jumped on cue. Sandalphon didn’t quite seem to have got the hang of ‘go on three’ and was slightly out of synch with the others. The rest seemed to be of the lower choirs and looked concerned that their jumping wouldn’t make the grade.

Gabriel noticed the door was open and hastily cleared his throat, motioning for the assembled angels to stand still. He handed Beelzebub today’s card.

“On the tenth day of Christmas my true love sent to me, ten angels leaping”. The demon watched perplexed as Gabriel gave the count and nine angels started leaping. After a moment’s hesitation Sandalphon joined them and the tableau was complete.

He turned to his demon-love and held his hands up in a silent ‘ta-dah’!

On receiving no reaction he motioned for the angels to stop their antics and explained further. “Well, we had demons yesterday so I had to fit angels in somewhere didn’t I? For balance…”. It still didn’t seem to be having any impact.

Beelzebub said slowly “you invited a host of angels down to Hell, put them all in my office, and got them to leap on command?” This was too weird - she’d thought the other days were odd, but this just about topped it. “Why did you do this very bizarre thing?”

Gabriel looked slightly embarrassed “I thought it was funny” he admitted reluctantly.

“So, I take it we can go now? I have the actual Lord’s work to do you know?” Michael sounded extremely irritated.

Beelzebub eyed the Archangel speculatively. She’d never seen an angel look so angry before. The flushed expression and barely contained wrath amused her no end.

She turned to Gabriel “can you get them to do it again?”

He smiled widely - the present had worked! Happily turning to the assembly of celestial beings he started up the count again.

As Michael’s expression darkened Beelzebub also smiled happily. As presents went this wasn’t too bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the tenth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Ten angels leaping,  
> Nine demons dancing,  
> Eight Erics sulking,  
> Seven Hell-spawn swimming,  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	11. On The Eleventh Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Eleven pipers piping,

Gabriel had squinted at the picture umpteen times now and it still didn’t make sense. There were eleven of them, they were holding what looked like short lengths of pipe attached to a large amorphous bag. They were each holding one of the pipes to their mouths for some reason he couldn’t quite fathom.

He’d seen the pipes in Hell. You certainly wouldn’t put your mouth anywhere near one. Well, not if you enjoyed life. Even if you didn’t enjoy life there would be less unpleasant ways to end it. He wasn’t sure what to do.

He’d done the usual and asked Dagon. She really was extremely helpful for a demon. When he’d told her so she’d snarled at him, all sharp teeth and bad breath, telling him she was only even talking to him so he didn’t annoy her boss too much. He didn’t quite believe her. He thought she was enjoying this.

Apparently the ‘pipes’ were a musical instrument - well Dagon was pretty sure they were meant to be ‘musical’. She described the noise as a ‘cacophony’, a word he’d had to go away and look up. She’d then said “don’t you dare bring hordes of them down here! You’ll drive Beelzebub to commit murder or worse - no-one could work in a room with even one bagpiper playing let alone eleven!”

He’d thought about that. Did he really want to drive the demons out of Hell? It might make things awkward up on earth, but perhaps they ought to get out more. They were very pale, especially his demon-love, maybe some vitamin D would do them good. He took one look at Dagon’s flushed angry face and those very sharp teeth and decided now wasn’t the time for enforced R&R.

When he’d first heard the word ‘pipers’ he’d thought of them as people who worked with literal pipes. As in plumbing. Now that really was a good idea. Hell was a never-ending nightmare of leaks and burst pipes. Perhaps what it needed was some really good ‘pipers’.

Hence when Beelzebub emerged from her relatively dry cavern the next morning she was astonished to discover that most of the rest of Hell was relatively dry too. As she wandered up towards her office she noticed tapping and banging noises along the way. She even caught sight of the occasional blue-overall wearing figure scurrying around in the shadows, carrying buckets and ladders.

This was very odd indeed. She approached her office door with the usual trepidation - usual that is for the last ten days or so. What would she find inside today?

It turned out that what was inside was a mop and bucket in one corner and a human with slightly glazed eyes diligently fitting something in brass to the pipe above her desk.

“Hold on love, be done in a minute” he said in a chirpy, cheerful way. He was nearly reduced to ashes for his presumption. It was only the demon’s curiosity that kept him alive for now.

Behind her the door opened and revealed Dagon. The fish-demon looked extraordinarily happy. Beelzebub scowled deeply. This was Hell and demons had no reason to look happy about being here. She opened her mouth to yell at her underling when she was taken off guard by being presented with the day’s inevitable angelic card.

“On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me, eleven plumbers plumbing”. At the word plumbers something clicked in her head.

The man currently perched on her desk fiddling about with the overhead pipe started whistling. Beelzebub would most certainly kill him painfully if he continued like this… 

A bright happy tune bleeped alarming from his pocket and he answered his phone with another cheerful chirp “Awwright Sarah! How’s it hangin’?”

Dagon hastened to jump between her boss and the nearly very unfortunate man, who continued his call oblivious to his near-death experience. Apparently ‘Sarah’ had found something ‘backed up right ‘orrible like’ and the man hastened to finish tightening the pipe above Beelzebub’s desk before rushing off, presumably to find Sarah.

The leak, the persistent, dripping leak, the one that no matter how many rags were wrapped around it, no matter how many times the joint was replaced, the whole length of pipe replaced in fact, still leaked. Beelzebub’s personal torment, the leak above her desk, had stopped. The demon climbed up onto the desk to inspect the site of the former leak more closely.

Encasing the pipe was something in the nature of a brass collar. Around the collar was something that looked like plastic. The damp rags had gone, thrown into a pile in the corner. The bucket, that had sat on the desk so long a ring of fungus had grown up around it’s base, had joined the rags in the corner just leaving the stain behind.

The demon sniffed carefully - this must be some sort of miracle. There was nothing remotely angelic about the repair. It smelled of human sweat, with a cloying, sweet silicone scent overlaying it. She touched the pipe just as the man reappeared at the door.

He still appeared cheerful and shouted in a friendly sort of way: “dunt touch that love - won’t be properly set for an hour or two. Dunno what your builders was playin’ at - the pipes is a mess, no way this is up to HSE standards - I oughtta send the lotta you home with stuff like this leakin’ out everywhere. Y’know there’s raw sewage in ya basements?!”

He appeared shocked by this revelation. Beelzebub simply nodded, of course she knew the basements slowly filled with a seeping noxious effluence no matter what they did to try to stop it. The man however, seemed un-phased.

“I sent Sarah and the boy up to fetch the puddle-pumps - just hope they don’t get clogged. We’ll be ‘ere well into the evening at this rate. Hope your boss dunt mind paying overtime. It’s double rates after 6pm”.

Beelzebub nodded again. Her boss sent these humans? Surely Satan hadn’t woken out of his sulk in the deepest pit and immediately sorted out maintenance. That just didn’t sound right. Then she remembered the card.

Two conflicting emotions fought for prominence on her boil encrusted face. She flitted between blind rage at the Archangel’s presumption of the title ‘her boss’ and intense happiness at the thought of no more leaks. In the end she settled for a deep frown, but inside something certainly very un-demonlike fluttered warmly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Eleven plumbers plumbing,  
> Ten angels leaping,  
> Nine demons dancing,  
> Eight Erics sulking,  
> Seven Hell-spawn swimming,  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.


	12. On The Twelfth Day of Christmas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Twelve drummers drumming,

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies in advance for letting this slide into something that might be called romantic....

Inevitably when Beelzebub awoke the next morning the leaks had started again. A drip here, a drip there. In places the puddles were beginning to refill already. It would no doubt take a while before they were fully established, but this morning was just a reminder that this was Hell and there was only a limited amount that could be done to improve it.

The small demon sighed deeply and tried to snuggle further under the covers, maybe if she didn’t wake up properly she could pretend the leaks were still gone. The dehumidifiers had run all day and, with frequent emptying, the cloying damp of Hell had dissipated a little. For a short while, just a short while, it had seemed bearable.

Day eleven had, at least, been a short term success she thought. This reminded the demon that today was day twelve. The last day. She should have been happy. Finally an end to all this silliness. Back to normality, no half suppressed anxiety at what ‘present’ the new day would bring. No nervous anticipation on the way to the office.

It was galling to the Lord of The Flies to admit it, but Gabriel had managed to touch something deep within her that she liked to deny even existed. His ‘gifts’, sometimes annoying, sometimes inconvenient and other times just downright bizarre, had given her something to look forward to.

Their relationship was at a delicate stage and the last few days had, in turn, added to the strain and lessened it too. Dancing around the council chambers, watching the ‘leaping’ Michael’s mounting anger, the weirdness of the swimming Hell-spawn - even Hastur and Ligur with their adopted family of trained attack-geese had bought an unaccustomed smile to the face of the small demon.

She sighed. Time to get up and find out what day twelve had in store for her. Hopefully it was something she would like. Not bird related at least. She found herself in the odd position of mentally crossing her fingers that there weren’t twelve ostriches, or geese, or even cows, in her office today.

As she emerged from the regions of sorrow and doleful shades where peace and rest can never dwell* - as the senior demons’ sleeping quarters were generally known - she heard a faint noise. The nearer she got to her office the louder it got. On the working floors the noise was nearing unbearable levels.

As the pulsing, crashing sound got worse and worse she realised the source was her own office. Glancing around she noted there were no demons to be seen anywhere in any of the offices. This was unacceptable. A rapidly swarming halo of angrily buzzing flies formed around the small demon’s head. She looked downright dangerous.

Throwing open her door her worst fears were realised. There were twelve humans stood awkwardly in the cramped space of her office. They had drums. More than just having the drums they were all enthusiastically banging said drums. Her eardrums felt the pressure and she hastily stepped back out to the corridor, unsure how the human ears hadn’t exploded at the volume.

A snapping of her fingers should have frozen the humans in mid-strike. Unfortunately there was a nasty sting of angelic protection around the tableau. She tried yelling for Gabriel, but the sound was easily absorbed by the racket made by the drummers.

Then she saw the card. It was taped to her office door. Tearing it down angrily she ripped the envelope open, removing the corner of the thick cream card at the same time: “On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love sent to me, twelve drummers drumming”. Well, she could see that!

It was perturbing to her that the other presents, unwelcome as many of them had been, had at least been well thought out. Who in their right mind would think she would ever in a million years welcome an office full of offensively loud drummers that she was unable to miracle away?

The small demon stormed up to Heaven in a terrible temper. Was this the whole aim of the exercise? Lull her into a false sense of security with eleven days of apparently kindly meant presents only to ambush her with this torture on day twelve? That was exactly the sort of nasty mean trick a demon would think of. If it was… actually, if it was, she was quite impressed by Gabriel’s demon-like evilness, but also depressed by it. 

At the pearly gates was an unexpected sight. Dagon was there, as were Hastur and Ligur, together with their inevitable gaggle of feathered trainee demons. Remembering the unexpected success of the geese of day six (who’d have thought Hastur had a mothering instinct?) momentarily made her forget to scowl. Then she remembered the day twelve ‘gift’ and resumed her previous expression.

Dagon stepped forward nervously, clearing her throat in an uncertain manner. “Gabriel wanted to… wanted to say - you’re welcome here until the drummers are done”. She stopped uncertainly, looking at her boss as if she feared a sudden fiery death (which indeed she did).

Beelzebub squinted at her second, then at Hastur and Ligur - who were both nodding and indicating the glowing angelic gate. Still unsure of what this meant she eyed the geese-demons instead. The brood were happily chasing round Hastur’s feet, pecking at his boots and flapping their little wings in an attempt to get under the protection of his ragged coat.

They seemed happy. It irritated her to see anything looking happy today, so she looked back to the gates. Gabriel had said she was ‘welcome here’? She wasn’t sure what to make of this. Demons were not welcome in Heaven. Hadn’t been welcome since the rebellion. She’d made brief visits of course - work dictated the occasional face-to-face - but she’d never stayed long.

When she saw Gabriel it was always in Hell. In Hell no-one cared - you could be a demon, an imp, a lost soul or a glowing Archangel, all were treated the same. As it was Hell ‘being treated the same’ meant everyone was treated equally badly, but the point was: there was no discrimination - unlike Heaven.

She cautiously pushed at the pearly gates, expecting at any moment to be struck down for her presumption, but nothing happened. Nothing apart from the slow swinging open of the gates that is. Behind the gates stood Gabriel. A unaccustomed frown marred his usually confidently beaming face. He seemed very worried.

“Ah, you came. Good, good. Well, come in then - I’ve g..got something to show you” He stuttered nervously in a very un-Archangel-like way.

Beelzebub stepped through the gates in a bit of a daze. She took his arm by reflex and the two walked slowly through the golden, shining archways of the Heavenly entrance hall. As they made their way further into Heaven the demon noticed various angels, they seemed to be smiling at her. This felt all very wrong.

Finally arriving at a doorway (Heaven didn’t have doors - privacy wasn’t something the virtuous should crave) Gabriel stopped. He ushered the demon inside nervously. There was a sofa in a glowing white leather, but on it were some very homely looking cushions in a grubby, balding corduroy of dark greenish brown.

At the far end of the room was a four poster bed. As expected it was white, but again there was an off-note. The gossamer fine drapes were black, with delicately embroidered silver spots. On getting closer Beelzebub realised the design was one of flies. She reached out a hand wonderingly and turned to Gabriel hoping for some explanation.

“Ummm, I hope it’s alright” he began nervously. “I wasn’t sure, well, interior design isn’t really my thing you know. I wanted it to be homely though so I thought, y’know the flies and the other stuff”. He gestured around the room.

The décor was a strange mix of Heavenly purity and Hellish taint, fluffy white carpet overlaid with dark stained rugs made of rags. A chandelier in gold and shimmering crystal, but with dripping red and black candles. A set of draws was only held level by a couple of bricks wedged under one side, but the dressing table was alabaster white with glowing golden edges.

“I wanted you to know you’re always welcome here. Welcome to stay I mean. It’s just that I realised, you know, I realised we only ever see each other in Hell and, well you’ve been very accommodating to me, umm, so welcoming, so nic…”

Before he could say the fateful word, the ultimate insult to demon-kind, before he could spoil the moment irrevocably, Beelzebub kissed him.

Day twelve was the best day yet and, for once, the demon dared to hope that there would be other, even better days, ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love sent to me  
> Twelve drummers drumming,  
> Eleven plumbers plumbing,  
> Ten angels leaping,  
> Nine demons dancing,  
> Eight Erics sulking,  
> Seven Hell-spawn swimming,  
> Six geese a-hatching,  
> Five rotting things!  
> Four brawling guards,  
> Three French horns,  
> Two eaten doves,  
> And an ostrich in a pine tree.
> 
> *This is a (near) quote from Paradise Lost. It describes Hell and I found it inspiring:  
> A Dungeon horrible, on all sides round  
> As one great Furnace flam'd, yet from those flames  
> No light, but rather darkness visible  
> Serv'd only to discover sights of woe,  
> Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace  
> And rest can never dwell, hope never comes  
> That comes to all; but torture without end


End file.
